Food and booze round-up (Feb 14)

Hams leg it out of Lunya; Waterloo Beer Festival and plenty more to chew on

Oh sow sweetDidn't get a bunch of supermarket roses? Oh sorry, you DID get a bunch of supermarket roses.

It's not to late to return the compliment by getting the swine in your life that entirely appropriate gift. One that smacks not so much sweet nothings as squeak nothings.

Last Christmas these whole legs of Spanish ham, from Liverpool deli Lunya, practically walked out of the place in Christmas stockings.

Leg man: Peter KinsellaPeter Kinsella sold over 100 of them – all earmarked as presents. And with prices ranging from £145 to over £400, it was clear gift-givers had no problem proving they can still bring home the bacon.

Lunya owner Peter says there might be a recession on, but it didn't stop people reaching for silk purses to secure the poshest pork scratching in town.

“It sounds like a lot, but a little goes a long way. Here,” he said, slicing some razor-thin Serrano off the bone.

For those wanting not so much to go the whole hog as out on a limb, there are three you can pick from: Trevelez Serrano (£145 for whole leg, £5.65 per 100g) is named after the highest village in Spain. It was the 'cheapest', and, for us, it packed the sweetest flavour.

Or there's Jabugo Jamon (£295 for whole leg, £12.95 per 100g) which is from pigs fattened on a mix of acorn and cereal feed.

Or how about the daddy? Iberico Bellota. This takes, on average, five years to reach your plate.

At £390 for a whole leg, you may wish to take five more years to savour each sweet moment of it - and/or chew over your relationship at leisure.

Noses are redThere is no point in telling you about the Liverpool Beer Festival this week at the Metropolitan Cathedral Crypt. Tickets sell out months in advance.

But here's the next best thing. The Waterloo Beer Festival is back next month. Now in its third year, it is clearly doing something very right in the hands of organisers Liverpool Organic Brewery.

LOB, as nobody calls them, are getting bigger themselves, having just won a deal to supply Head of Steam pubs nationwide, so plenty of yeasty odours coming from the plant in Bootle.

Plenty of yeasty odours also from Christ The King church come Thursday March 22-Sunday March 25, and not just from the 160 cask ales and 50 ciders. The Peninsula Pies and Liverpool Cheese Company will also have a part to play in that.

With day and evening sessions and jazz on the Sunday, it's a popular one. Tickets (from £5) are best obtained online by visiting here.

No trainersCupid stuntThe Waterloo Beer Festival would undoubtedly welcome all-comers, as do most hostelries around L22, but not everyone.

On the way back, those wishing to wet their whistles further, while waiting for a Merseyrail train, may wish to check that their name isn't Osbourne, Cameron or something first, as this board outside Stamps 2, in South Road, cautioned last week.

As there are plenty of public schools in the area, we can only assume one or two of the more thoughtful descriptions have been gleaned from prefects versed in the local anchovy-toast-and-rugger speak, and nothing more common.

Not all chicken is the sameBack in the burbs at the other end of the city, there's good news for food lovers around Penny Lane and beyond. A trial farmers market has been such a success over the past three months that residents in the area have voted with a resounding YES for it to continue.

And so it came to pass that the Allerton Road Farmers Market will now take place on the third Saturday of every month. Find it outside the library.

A stock investmentThe last item was for those who can. Unfortunately, that's only half of the population.

Statistics show that 50 per cent of adults do not cook at home. Even more worryingly, says Speke's Can Cook Studio, 90 per cent of young people do not know how to cook a simple meal, neglecting the kitchen due to a lack of basic skills and understanding.

Giles Bancroft, Nicola Dodd and Jane Ritchie- Smyth, of the 5by25 Campaign, at the Can Cook Teaching in Liverpool launchWith their new campaign, Can Cook is striving to tackle these figures head on, and teach Liverpool how to cook. A 100-day campaign will invite up to 500 companies to invest £100 each. This investment works in two ways; Can Cook will invite one employee from each donating company to attend the cookery training; promoting health and wellbeing in the workplace. Can Cook will then use the balance to teach young people to cook in a school or community setting.

The target is to teach 2,000 people of all ages across Liverpool to cook three meals from scratch – the results of which will then feed directly into the national 5by25 campaign organised by EBLEX (English Beef and Lamb Executive).

Robbie Davison, director of Can Cook, said:“The lack of food and cookery knowledge amongst people, young and older, has reached epidemic proportions - with dire effects on health. Teaching Liverpool to Cook will change that - we will create a food and cookery revolution and leave a legacy of people who are healthy, happy and can create a fantastic plate of food!”